Method and system for integrating television brand advertising with promotional marketing

ABSTRACT

A method for integrating television brand advertising with promotional marketing includes providing an image to be displayed in different television commercials for products from different advertisers, the image indicating a website; and providing at the website coupon offers for the products from the different advertisers. The image will alert a viewer of the television commercial that a special coupon offer is available at a website. The viewer will go to the website and be able to select from one or more coupon offers available to consumers in their market area. The consumer then prints the coupons, or adds credit to a coupon card, which is then redeemed at the retailer. The system allows for Point Of Sale (POS) redemption, or more traditional redemption through a coupon clearinghouse. The television commercials may be encoded with information to be used at a television signal processing location for selecting the images, and different images may be provided to television signal processing locations associated with different market areas.

BACKGROUND

This invention relates to the field promotional marketing. Morespecifically, this invention relates to a method and system forintegrating television brand advertising with promotional marketing.

The promotional marketing and coupon industry is fraught with waste andinefficiency. In the year 2001, 344 billion coupons were distributed,while only 3.9 billion or 1.1% were redeemed (Coupon Council ofAmerica). Total savings to consumers were $3 billion. Freestandinginserts (FSI's), one of the more popular ways to nationally distributecoupons, had a redemption rate of less than one percent in 2001. Oneinteresting note is that coupons distributed over the Internet had aredemption rate of 2.91%, almost three times the rate of FSI couponsredeemed.

Another popular form of marketing is brand advertising, which istypically done by the use of television commercials. According to theTelevision Bureau of advertising, in 2001, the amount spent both innetwork and spot television advertising was $35.8 billion.

The Internet as an advertising medium is hampered by its low reach, buthas the benefits of being able to be more precisely targeted to anaudience. FSI's and television have a large reach, but are harder totarget to a specific audience. FSI creation also has the disadvantage ofa longer planning time, as graphic ads need to be created, and thenprinted and inserted into newspapers on a national basis. This lead-timeadds months onto a marketing plan. Tailoring specific offers forspecific geographic markets also adds expense to a campaign with thecreation of multiple different ads or commercials for each market.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The above-described drawbacks and deficiencies of the prior art areovercome or alleviated by a method for integrating television brandadvertising with promotional marketing, the method including: providinga first image to be displayed in different television commercials forproducts from different advertisers, the first image indicating awebsite; and providing at the website coupon offers for the productsfrom the different advertisers. The method may further include:providing second images to be displayed in the different televisioncommercials, the second images indicating price point offers associatedwith the coupon offers for the products.

In one embodiment, the first and second images are inserted in thetelevision commercial at a television signal processing location. Thetelevision commercial may be encoded with information to be used at thetelevision signal processing location for selecting at least one of thefirst image and the second image. Different second images may beprovided to television signal processing locations associated withdifferent market areas.

In another embodiment, the method further includes, selecting from thecoupon offers a plurality of coupon offers available to a consumer,wherein the selecting is performed using at least one of a location ofthe consumer, past behavior of the consumer on the website, and couponspreviously redeemed by the consumer. In another embodiment, the methodfurther includes providing at the website a printable coupon orproviding credit to a coupon card for redeeming at least one of thecoupon offers. In yet another embodiment, the method includes reportingto at least one of the different advertisers information including atleast one of: a number of coupons printed by consumers, and a number ofcoupons redeemed by the consumers.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

Referring to the exemplary drawings wherein like elements are numberedalike in the several Figures:

FIG. 1 is a schematic view of a television screen displaying acommercial for a product and an indicator indicating a coupon offeravailable for the product;

FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram of a system for integrating televisionbrand advertising with promotional marketing;

FIG. 3 is a schematic diagram of the system of FIG. 2 including aplurality of television signal processing locations each servicing aplurality of consumer locations;

FIG. 4 is a flow chart depicting a process for creation of a coupondatabase;

FIG. 5 is a flow chart depicting a process for providing localadvertising information to television signal processing locations;

FIG. 6 is a flow chart depicting a process employed by a website fordetermining a market area of a consumer;

FIG. 7 is a flow chart depicting a process employed by the website forproviding a selection of coupon offers to a consumer;

FIG. 8 is a flow chart depicting a process for coupon printing orencoding;

FIG. 9 is a flow chart depicting a retailer redemption process; and

FIG. 10 is a flow chart depicting a process employed by the website forproviding special offers to consumers who have visited the sitepreviously.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Referring to FIG. 1, the present invention provides an image of aspecial offer indicator (indicator) 10 to be displayed on a televisionmonitor 12 on top of a television commercial for a product, service, orthe like (hereinafter “product”). The indicator 10 will alert a viewerof the television monitor 12 that a special coupon offer is availablefor the product at a website, the Uniform Resource Locator (URL) ofwhich is shown on the indicator 10. As used herein, a “website” is asite (location) on the World Wide Web. The consumer will go to thewebsite, provide data indicating their geographic location, and be ableto select from one or more coupon offers available to consumers in theirmarket area. The indicator 10 may be displayed on top televisioncommercials for any number of different products from any number ofdifferent advertisers, and the website will provide coupon offersavailable for the different products. The consumer then prints thecoupons, or adds credit to a unique coupon card, which is then redeemedat the retailer. The coupon card may be provided by the websiteoperator, or may be a customer loyalty card available from a retailer.The system allows for Point Of Sale (POS) redemption, or moretraditional redemption through a coupon clearinghouse. Anotherembodiment allows the coupon card to contain all offers for thatconsumer's market area without the need for encoding the offers on thecard.

Referring to FIG. 2, a system 50 for integrating television brandadvertising with promotional marketing is shown. System 50 includes fivegeneral locations: a consumer location (e.g., a household) 52, a pointof sale location (e.g., a retail store) 54, a television signalprocessing location (e.g., a national network source, a regionaltelevision station source, or a local broadcast source such as for acable television system) 56, an advertiser location 58, and a websiteserver location 60. Positioned at the consumer location 52 are thetelevision monitor 12, a television signal receiver 64, a computer 66,and a printer 68. Positioned at the point of sale location 54 is aregister 70, such as a cash register, computer, or the like forregistering a sale of a product or service. Positioned at the televisionsignal processing location 56 are a computer 72, video source 74,decoder 76, and a graphics generator 78. A transmitter 80 may also belocated at the television signal processing location for transmittingthe television signals to the consumer locations 52. Positioned at thewebsite server location 60 is at least one server computer 82.Positioned at the advertiser location 58 are a computer 84, an encoder86, and a video source 88. It will be appreciated that these locationsare provided to facilitate description of the system 50, and the variouscomponents of the system 50 may be positioned at locations differentthan those shown as is convenient for performing the method describedherein.

Server computer 82 is coupled to computers 66, 72, and 84 by one or morecommunications networks 90. Similarly, server computer 82 may be coupledto one or more point of sale registers 70 by a communications network90. Communications networks 90 may be a common communications network ordifferent communications networks, and may include one or more of alocal area network, a wide area network, an Internet, a telephonenetwork, and the like. To facilitate the description of system 50,computer 82 and computers 66, 72, and 84 are discussed herein as beingsingle computers. However, it will be appreciated that the functionsperformed by server computer 82 and the functions performed by computers66, 72, and 84 may be distributed to any number of computers.

Referring to FIG. 3, system 50 is shown including a plurality oftelevision signal processing locations (e.g., television stations) 56,with each television signal processing location 56 being associated witha plurality of consumer locations 52. It will be appreciated thattelevision signal processing locations 56 may provide the televisionsignal to consumer locations 52 directly or through any number ofadditional television signal processing locations 56. For example, thetelevision signal processing location 56 may include a regionaltelevision station source or a local broadcast source that transmits thetelevision signals directly to consumer locations 52 via air or cable.In another example, the television signal processing location 56 shownmay include a national network source, which processes televisionsignals and provides them to one or more regional television stationsources or to local broadcast sources for transmission to consumerlocations 52. A single server location 60 may be associated with anynumber of television signal processing locations 56 and any number ofadvertiser locations 58.

The function of system 50 in performing a method for integratingtelevision brand advertising with promotional marketing will now bediscussed. When a manufacturer, retailer, television commercialdistributor, company that traffics television commercials, or anycombination thereof (hereinafter “advertiser”) decides to promote aproduct or service using a cents-off coupon, the advertiser decides ifthe coupon is to be valid for consumers within an entire geographic areaor whether the coupon is to be valid only for consumers within one ormore market areas within the geographic area. Each geographic area maybe defined by political areas (e.g., countries, states, counties,cities, etc.), product marketing regions, or other convenient criteria.Each market area is a portion of a geographical region, and may bedefined by television Designated Market Areas (DMA), zip codes,political areas (e.g., countries, states, counties, cities, etc.),product marketing regions, or any other criteria. The advertiser mightalso decide that different price point offers (coupon values) are to beused for different market areas within the geographic area. The methodand system for integrating television brand advertising with promotionalmarketing described herein allows for multiple price point offers overmultiple geographic areas and market areas.

After deciding on the geographic area, the market areas, and the pricepoint offer for each geographic or market area, the advertiser thenaccesses a coupon database stored on server computer 82 via network 90using computer 84. The server 82 is programmed with instructions forimplementing a process 100 for creating a coupon database for theadvertiser's product. A flow chart depicting an example of this processis shown in FIG. 4. In the example of FIG. 4, the geographic area is anation, and the market area is a DMA or zip code area. Upon selecting aproduct and coupon offer for the product (block 102), the advertiseraccesses the server 82. The advertiser is presented with a selection ofwhether the coupon offer is regional (e.g., national) or based on marketarea (e.g., DMA or zip code) (block 104). If the advertiser selectsregion, he or she is presented with a user interface allowing a singleprice point offer to be provided for the geographic area (block 106).For example, a soup advertiser may want to offer a $1 off coupon toeveryone in the United States during the warm summer months, when soupsales are slower. If the advertiser selects market area, he or she ispresented with a user interface allowing the different price pointoffers (cents-off offers) to be entered for different market areas(block 108). For example, a soup advertiser may offer a $1 off coupon onsoup in a warmer climate market such as Las Vegas, where soup sales arelower. In the Boston DMA, the price point offer may only be $0.50, asmore soup is consumed in colder climates, and the call to action can bea lower offer. In another example, an advertiser may offer a $1.00 offcoupon to consumers in the same zip code, and offer no discount toconsumers outside this zip code. The size of the market area, the numberof market areas, and the number of different price point offers made toconsumers within the different market areas can be configured as needed.The database stored on server computer 82 includes fields foridentifying the advertiser, the market area(s) associated with thecoupon offer, the price point offers for each geographic or market area,and other details. The system database is only limited to servercomputer 82 capacity, and this capacity can be expanded as needed byadding more memory to server computer 82, or more server computers 82 tothe system.

After the different price point offers have been entered for thedifferent market areas, the process continues where it is determined howthe market areas are defined (e.g., by DMA or by zip code) (block 110),and the different market area definitions are converted to a single,predetermined market area definition (blocks 112, 114). In the exampleshown, if the different price point offers have been entered fordifferent DMAs, the DMAs are converted to their corresponding zip codeor codes. From either block 112 or block 114, the process 100 continuesat block 116 where the coupon database is populated with the couponoffer data.

As shown at block 118, the coupon database may include fields such as:market area or areas in which the coupon offer is valid (e.g., zip codeor codes for coupon offer), specific price point offer (value) of thecoupon for the indicated market area or areas, advertiser (e.g.,manufacturer) name, offer valid dates, color coding information,printing control or other security information, expiration date,purchase requirement, product name and logo, website name and logo,picture of the product, UPC bar code information, retailer information.After the database has been populated, the process ends (block 120).

Any number of advertisers may input coupon offers to the database onserver computer 82 for any number of their products. As previouslynoted, the system database is only limited to server computer 82capacity, and this capacity can be expanded as needed by adding morememory to server computer 82, or more server computers 82 to the system.

Referring again to FIG. 1, the advertiser records and edits thetelevision commercial to its finished form, which is provided via videosource 88 to encoder 86. The video source 88 may include a pre-recordedvideo tape, a video feed from a television station, a digitally storedvideo, or any other provider of video signals. The television commercialfrom video source 88 is then encoded with signals from computer 84indicating the position, size, and duration of the indicator 10 that isto be placed in the television commercial. The indicator informationwill be downloaded to computer 84 from server 82 via network 90 forencoding into the television commercial.

Preferably the indicator information is encoded in the Vertical BlankingInterval, or VBI of the television commercial. This is the area of avideo signal that is between video frames, and has capacity to containsmall amounts of data. One example of VBI use is closed captioning forthe hearing impaired, commonly contained on line 21 of the video signal.The Society of Motion Picture Television Engineers (SMPTE) has created astandard for data formats within the VBI (SMPTE Standard 334.m). Theregional advertising information encoded into the commercial may bepacketized, as described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,604,542.

The indicator information only needs to be encoded on the commercialonce, as the appropriate indicator 10 to be inserted into the televisioncommercial will be provided to the television signal processinglocations 56, as is discussed in further detail hereinafter. Thus, onlyone specially encoded commercial needs to be created for any number oftelevision signal processing locations 56. This will save time and moneyin distribution of the commercials, as different offers may be insertednationally, locally, or regionally at the television signal processinglocations 56.

After the indicator information is encoded into the televisioncommercial, the encoded television commercial is sent to each televisionsignal processing location 56 as a video tape, a digital video disk, adigital signal via a communications network, a video signal feed from atelevision station, or any other convenient means.

Referring to FIG. 5, a process 130 for providing advertising informationto each television signal processing location 56 is shown. This process130 may be performed at a predetermined frequency (e.g., once per day),or whenever the coupon database is updated. Information for eachtelevision signal processing location 56 is included in a TV stationdatabase in server computer 82. For each television signal processinglocation 56, the TV station database may include fields for informationsuch as: station call letters, network affiliation, contact information,status of participation in system 50 (active, inactive), time zone, dataregarding broadcasting equipment (e.g., decoder 76 and graphicsgenerator 78) used at location 56, data feed method, and associatedmarket area or areas (e.g., DMA, zip code, etc.).

After the coupon database has been created as described with referenceto FIG. 4. (block 132), the coupon database is processed to provide alist of current coupon offers (block 134). For coupon offers availableto the entire geographic area, advertising information is retrieved fromthe coupon database and is sent via network to each television signalprocessing location (blocks 136, 138, and 140). For coupon offersavailable to specified market areas, the coupon database is queried todetermine the market area for each coupon offer (block 142), then the TVstation database of is queried to determine the television signalprocessing locations 56 associated with the market areas of the couponoffers (block 144). The advertising information for each coupon offer isthen sent to the television signal processing locations 56 associatedwith the market area or areas of the coupon offer (block 146).

After the advertising information is downloaded to the specifictelevision signal processing locations 56 (blocks 140, 146), it is usedto populate an image database in computer 84. The advertisinginformation includes graphic images for the indicator 10, which is shownin FIG. 1. The advertising information may also include an audio tone tobe inserted into the transmitted commercial, as an audio indicator of anoffer to the consumer. When the commercial airs, the advertisinginformation is selected from the image database in computer 84, insertedinto the commercial (block 148), and transmitted to the consumerlocations 52 (block 150) or provided to another television signalprocessing location 56.

As shown in FIG. 1, the indicator 10 may consist of a two-part graphicimage having a first image 14 and a second image 16. The first image 14identifies a website managed by server computer 82, alerting theconsumer that there is a coupon offer for the specific product on thewebsite. For example, the first image 14 may include at least a portionof a Uniform Resource Locator (URL) 18 of the website. The second image16 contains a specific price point offer 20, be it cents or dollars off.This second image 16 can be customized for each market area individuallyby providing different local advertising information to differenttelevision signal processing locations 56. The number of images storedin the image database of computer 84 need not be that many. For example,there may be a first image 14, which always remains the same, and a fewprice point offer second images 16.

When the encoded commercial is provided by video source 74 at televisionsignal processing location 56, the VBI encoded information is decoded bydecoder 76 and provided to computer 72. The information about where,when, and what indicator 10 is to be displayed is included in theinformation, and will be used by computer 72 to query the appropriatelocation in the image database. For example, the decoded information mayindicate that the indicator 10 is to be displayed in the lower left handcorner of the displayed commercial for a period of 20 seconds, andshould appear 15 seconds after the start of the commercial. The imageand audio information from the image database is retrieved by computerand output to graphics generator 78, which inserts the video signals forthe indicator and any audio signals into the commercial.

After the indicator 10 has been inserted in the video signal for thecommercial, television signals provided to another television signalprocessing location 56 or are provided to a transmitter 80 where theyare transmitted to any number of consumer locations 52. The televisionsignals may be transmitted to the consumer locations 52 using anyconventional transmission system, such as, for example, a radiofrequency transmission system, satellite transmission system, opticaltransmission system, or hard-wired (e.g., cable) transmission.Transmitter 80 transmits a television commercial to be received by thereceiver 64 and displayed by the television monitor 12 at the consumerlocations 52.

Periodically, the image database at one or more television signalprocessing locations 56 may be updated, either over network 90 ormanually. This allows for the removal of indicators 10 associated withold offers, and the replacement of indicators 10 to reflect updatedoffers. If, for a particular television signal processing location 56, acomputer 72 is not coupled to server 82 or does not have the necessaryimage database, the commercial simply plays without the indicator 10,with the encoded VBI data being ignored by the computer 72 and formatter78.

While VBI encoding of the commercial is preferred, any commerciallyavailable encoder/decoder combination may be used. By allowing theencoded data to be in specific lines within the television signal,multiple decoder formats can be used within the same commercial,encoding it only once. Alternatively, with a national, regional, orlocal promotion campaign, all or part of the indicator 10 could bephysically placed (not encoded) in the television commercial at, forexample, the advertiser location 58, allowing television signalprocessing locations 56 that are not participating in the promotion tooffer viewer benefit.

System 50 allows for the indicator 10 to be displayed on a local,regional, or national basis while allowing for coupon offers to betailored to a geographical or market area basis. The indicator 10 may bediscreet enough as not to distract from the brand advertising of thetelevision commercial, but noticeable enough to viewers interested inpromotional offers.

When a consumer viewing television monitor 12 is alerted to the specificoffer by viewing the indicator 10, they can use computer 66 to connectto the website maintained by server 82 via network 90. The website isconfigured to determine the market area of the consumer using an inputfield to be filled in by the user or by querying a cookie located in theconsumer's computer 66. The use of the unique identifier or “cookie” incomputer 66 allows server 82 to identify a particular user and to targetthat specific user for specific coupon and price point offers, based ongeographic location, past behavior on the website, or by couponspreviously redeemed.

FIG. 6 is a flow chart depicting a process 160 that may be employed byserver computer 82 for determining the market area of the consumer.After the consumer views the television commercial with the indicator 10(block 162), the consumer browses the website indicated in the indicatorusing computer 66 (block 164). The website then queries the consumer'scomputer 66 for a cookie associated with the website (block 166). If thecookie exists (block 168), indicating that the consumer has previouslylogged into the site, the consumer is logged into the website and acustomized greeting appears (block 170). If the cookie does not exist(block 168), the consumer is asked whether he or she has logged onto thesite before (block 172). If the consumer responds affirmatively, theconsumer is provided with a field for entering a password (block 174),and, after entering the password, the consumer is logged into the siteand the consumer's information is retrieved from the consumer database(block 170). If the consumer responds negatively (block 172), thewebsite queries the consumer for registration information such as anaddress, phone number, zip code, password, and the like (block 176).This information is then stored with a corresponding consumer identifierin the consumer database (block 178), and a cookie including theidentifier is provided to computer (block 180). The consumer is thenlogged into the site (block 170). After the consumer is logged onto thesite (block 170), the consumer's market area (e.g., zip code) isretrieved from the cookie in computer 66 (block 182), and the user isredirected to a coupon offer page in the website (block 184).

FIG. 7 is a flow chart depicting a process 200 employed by the websitefor providing the coupon offer page to the consumer. After theconsumer's market area is determined using the process of FIG. 6 (block202), the consumer is asked whether he or she wants to search forspecific coupon offers (block 204). If the consumer answersaffirmatively, the consumer is presented with a field to enter key words(block 206), which are used along with the consumer's market area toquery the coupon database (block 208). If no coupon offers matching thekey words and market area are found (block 210), the consumer is againasked to enter key words (block 206). If coupon offers are found (block210), the consumer is presented with a listing of the matching couponoffers (block 212). If, at block 204, the consumer answers negatively,the coupon database is queried for coupon offers valid in the consumer'smarket area (block 214). If coupon offers are found, the consumer ispresented with a listing of the matching coupon offers (block 212). Thecoupon offers may be presented to the consumer arranged by category andsub category of item (block 216). Associated with each coupon offerpresented to the consumer is a check box, field, or the like, whichallows the consumer to select one or more coupon offers from the list(block 218). After the consumer is finished selecting coupon offers(block 220), a coupon printing or encoding process 250, as shown in FIG.8, is started (block 222).

Referring to FIG. 8, the coupon printing or encoding process 250 beginsafter the consumer is finished selecting coupon offers (block 252). Theprocess 250 continues at block 254, where a list of the coupon offersselected by the user is generated from the coupon database. At block256, it is determined whether the coupon is to be printed. This decisionmay be made in response to a selection by the consumer, or by apredetermined setting made by the advertiser or operator of the website.If the coupon is to be printed, a unique session and user ID isgenerated from the coupon data and from the consumer's information(block 258). The coupons are then generated featuring the appropriatefields from the coupon database (block 260). The coupons are then sentto a secure print application for printing (block 262), and may beencoded with a unique identification. The consumer may choose to printthe coupon in either color or black and white. The printed couponcontains specific pieces of data pulled from the database in server 82.These pieces of data may include: specific price point offer or facevalue of the coupon; color coding to prevent fraud; expiration date(either fixed or based on date printed); purchase requirement; productname and logo; “Internet Coupon” labeling; website name and logo;picture of the product; encoded UPC bar code; legal disclaimer wording.Each coupon may also be encoded with a specific user ID to preventfraudulent redemption.

In one embodiment, the website managed by server 82 could provide theconsumer with the ability to select a particular retailer or point ofsale 54 for each coupon selected. The server 82 would then tailor thecoupon for the particular retailer or point of sale 54. In anotherembodiment, a particular retailer or point of sale 54 may pay theadvertiser or operator of the website to have the name of the retaileror point of sale 54, along with any additional savings for shopping atthe retailer or point of sale 54, appear on the coupon. This may belimited by server 82 to consumers in certain market areas.

Depending on advertiser preference, the website managed by server 82 mayallow for the printing of individual coupon offers on single sheets ofletter-sized paper that would not require the coupons to be torn or cutto be redeemed. This single sheet of paper would help save in paperhandling fees from a standard coupon redemption clearinghouse.

If the coupons are not to be printed (block 256), the coupon offers arestored in a database in server computer 82 by consumer identification(block 264). The coupon offers can then be retrieved by useridentification at the point of sale 54. Alternatively, if the couponsare not to be printed (block 256), the coupon offers may be stored ascredit associated with a customer loyalty card provided by a retailer.For example, a retailer may offer a customer loyalty card that, whenused during check out at the retailer's store, provides a discountavailable only to customers with the loyalty card. Server computer 82may be configured to provide the coupon offers to the point of salelocation 54, or to a central server associated with point of salelocation 54, where the coupon offers are stored as credit on thecustomer loyalty card. When the consumer uses the customer loyalty cardat checkout at the point of sale location 54, the coupon discount willbe applied. This may be an option available to the consumer on thewebsite, or may be performed automatically by an agreement between theoperator of the website and the retailer.

From either block 262 or block 264, process 250 continues at block 266,where a record of the offers printed or stored by the consumer is storedin an invoice database in server computer 82. Records in the invoicedatabase are sorted by advertiser (block 268), which allows the operatorof server 82 to bill the advertiser for the printing or selection of thespecific offers. Software contained within the server 82 allows forspecific control of the coupon offers, including number of coupons thatcan be printed by one individual.

After the invoice database is sorted (block 268), the consumer's sessionat the website is over, and the consumer may redeem the coupons at thepoint of sale 54. Referring to FIG. 9, a coupon redemption process 280is shown. When the consumer shops with the retailer at the point of sale54 (block 282), they can select their products for purchase from theirshopping list or coupon list (block 284). After the consumer hasselected the products for purchase, they then enter the checkout line topurchase the products (block 286).

If the coupons are printed (block 288), the consumer presents the couponto the retailer (block 290) and a scanning device at the point of sale54, which may be part of register 70, is used to scan the entire sheetof coupons at once (block 292). The scanning device may include a feedermechanism and bar code reader. Once the discounts have been applied tothe purchase, the coupon sheet or coupons may be destroyed, marked asused, or otherwise voided. Scanning the bar code of the coupon providesthe register 70 with information regarding the coupons, including eachproduct and its associated discount (block 300).

If the consumer is using a coupon card, the consumer presents theretailer with the card (block 294), and the retailer scans or otherwiseenters the consumer's coupon card and provides the coupon card ID to theserver 82 via network 90 (block 296). If the coupon card is a customerloyalty card provided by the retailer, the coupon card ID is matched tocoupon offers previously selected and stored as credit on the customerloyalty card (block 298). Information regarding each product and itsassociated discount (price point offer) are then provided to theregister 70 (block 300) by any system employed by the point of salelocation 54 for applying customer loyalty cards. Alternatively, if thecoupon card is provided by the website operator, the consumer's couponcard ID is matched to coupon offers previously selected and stored bythe consumer in server 82 (block 298). The server 82 then providesregister 70 with information regarding each product and its associateddiscount (price point offer) via network 90 (block 300).

After the information for each product and its associated discount isprovided to the register 70 (block 300), register 70 matches theproducts purchased to the specific coupon offers (block 302). If thereis no match (block 302), no discount is applied to the productspurchased by the consumer (block 304). If there is a match (block 302),the applicable discount is applied at the point of sale (306). If theregister 70 is coupled to the server 82, point of sale redemptioninstantly occurs, and the sales data is provided by register 70 toserver 82 via network 90. The sales data is then recorded in the server82 database for invoicing the advertiser (blocks 308, 312). The salesdata may also used to void the coupon offer in the server 82 for theparticular customer to prevent duplicate use (block 310). If there is nopoint of sale redemption (e.g., if register 70 is not connected tonetwork 90), the coupon is sent to a manual coupon redemption center forcollecting and counting.

The data collected by server 82 for coupon printing/storage and for eachcoupon redemption may be provided in report form for use by advertisersor retailers. This report can be provided to advertisers and retailerson a yearly, monthly, weekly, daily, or sub-daily basis, and may beapplied by advertisers or retailers in various ways. For example, areport indicating the number of coupon offers selected by consumers willallow an advertiser to determine the effectiveness of a coupon offer. Inanother example, the server 82 can detect if a specific coupon offer hasbeen printed, but not yet redeemed. A report indicating this informationwill allow the advertiser to increase or otherwise change the offer tohasten redemption. In another example, the number of offers printed orstored by consumers in a market area can be used to forecast a demandfor that product in that market area. With such forecasting ability,advertisers or retailers can stock a particular product in advance ofthis demand. Other information that may be reported by server 82 includenumber of site registrations, number of coupon cards versus number ofprinted coupons used, redemption rate as a function of discount, and thelike.

The database in server 82 may be configured to allow advertisers toupdate their coupon offers themselves, using computer 82 at theadvertiser location 58, allowing the advertiser to quickly change couponoffers without contacting the various television signal processinglocations 56. Based on aggregate data received on specific redemptionrates for specific offers, which may be stored in server 82 andretrieved by computer 84 or provided in the aforementioned reportsprovided by server 82, the coupon offer may be changed based onimmediate and actual redemption data. This change to the coupon offerfor the product can be made quickly by altering the coupon database inserver 82 using computer 84 (or any other authorized computer) vianetwork 90. Once the coupon database has been changed, the appropriateadvertising information can be provided to the image database at each ofthe appropriate television signal processing locations 56. Thus, thenext time the television signal processing location 56 transmits thetelevision commercial, the updated indicator 10 will appear, and whenthe consumer accesses the website to retrieve the coupon, the couponoffer will have already been updated.

FIG. 10 depicts a process 320 employed by the website managed by server82 for providing special offers to consumers who have visited thewebsite previously. When a previous consumer browses the website managedby server (block 322), the cookie is read from the consumer's computer66 (block 324). Using the consumer's identification number from thecookie, the consumer's past coupon redemption behavior is retrieved fromthe database in server 82 (block 326). If the consumer has not redeemedcoupon offers previously retrieved by the consumer from the coupondatabase (block 328), those unredeemed coupon offers are retrieved fromthe database (block 330). If any of these unredeemed offers have beenchanged or marked for additional discounts (block 332), these offers arepresented to the consumer in interstitial or pop-up fashion (block 334),allowing the consumer to select the offers that appeal to them (block336). After the consumer has selected the offers (block 336), or if theconsumer has redeemed all previously printed or stored offers (block328), the consumer's past behavior and redemption are analyzed (block338). This analysis may include, for example, providing bonus points forthe number of times a consumer has redeemed coupons. Based on theresults of the analysis, the server then determines whether the consumeris entitled to other special offers (block 340). For example, additionalcents-off may be provided to a consumer who has accumulated a certainamount of bonus points. The special offers may be presented to theconsumer for selection in interstitial or pop-up fashion (block 342).After the consumer reviews and selects any desired offers (block 344),the consumer provided with the regular offers page of the website (block346), as described with reference to FIG. 7, where the consumer canselect regular offers and proceed to the coupon printing or coupon cardprocess of FIG. 8 (block 348).

The present invention provides a way to use the large reach oftelevision advertising to help target promotional or coupon marketing.This will allow greater efficiency of current advertising monies beingspent on both brand and promotional advertising. It also allows greatertime flexibility in the changing of offers, from months to mere hoursand the ability to offer quickly-perishable coupons. For example, if themanufacturer noticed a particular coupon offer was not doing well in onemarket area vs. the rest of the region, all they would have to do iscontact the server location 60 with instructions to change the couponoffer. This may be accomplished through a connection with server 82 vianetwork 90. Within hours or minutes, the coupon offer in the database inserver 82 would be changed, and advertising information including thechange would be downloaded to computer at the television signalprocessing location 56 associated with the market area, where the imagedatabase in computer would be updated to include the changed price pointoffer displayed in indicator 10. The next time the TV commercial istransmitted for that product, the new price point offer would bepresented to the consumer. To change the same offer in a nationallyprinted FSI would take months, if not being impossible.

While the invention has been described with reference to a preferredembodiment, it will be understood by those skilled in the art thatvarious changes may be made and equivalents may be substituted forelements thereof without departing from the scope of the invention. Inaddition, many modifications may be made to adapt a particular situationor material to the teachings of the invention without departing from theessential scope thereof. Therefore, it is intended that the inventionnot be limited to the particular embodiment disclosed as the best modecontemplated for carrying out this invention, but that the inventionwill include all embodiments falling within the scope of the appendedclaims. Moreover, the use of the terms first, second, etc. do not denoteany order or importance, but rather the terms first, second, etc. areused to distinguish one element from another.

1. A method implemented using one or more computers, comprising:receiving, at a server, coupon information communicated directly from aplurality of advertisers to the server, the coupon information defininga plurality of coupon offers for different products, wherein the couponinformation from at least some of the advertisers specifies one or moreparameters for distributing one or more coupon offers; communicating,across one or more networks, from the server, to multiple televisionstations, a visual website indicator, wherein the visual websiteindicator indicates a website associated with the server at which theplurality of coupon offers are made available; the server maintaininginformation about the multiple television stations, from whichtelevision commercials are broadcast to a plurality of users; and basedon the coupon information specified by the plurality of advertisers andthe information about the multiple television stations, the servercommunicating to the multiple television stations: (a) first dataindicating a plurality of television commercials into which the samevisual website indicator is to be inserted, (b) a plurality of pricepoint indicators indicating price points for the one or more couponoffers, and (c) second data indicating, for each television commercialin the plurality of television commercials, which particular price pointindicator of the plurality of price point indicators to insert intowhich particular television commercial in the plurality of televisioncommercials; wherein the first data and the second data collectivelyindicate that a particular television station is to 1) insert the visualwebsite indicator with a first price point indicator into a firsttelevision commercial prior to the particular television stationbroadcasting the first television commercial, and 2) insert the visualwebsite indicator with a second price point indicator that is differentfrom the first price point indicator into a second television commercialprior to the particular television station broadcasting the secondtelevision commercial; wherein the server is at a location other thanlocations of the multiple television stations and the advertisers;wherein the server is logically separated from the multiple televisionstations and the advertisers by one or more communications networkscomprising any of a local area network, wide area network, and anInternet.
 2. The method of claim 1, wherein receiving the couponinformation includes the server receiving from the advertisersinformation that indicates the price points associated with the one ormore coupon offers.
 3. The method of claim 1, wherein the first pricepoint indicator is a first price point offer image that represents afirst price point offer for a first coupon offer pertaining to a firstproduct advertised in the first television commercial.
 4. The method ofclaim 3, further comprising: receiving updated coupon information thatincludes an update to the first price point offer; and the servercommunicating to the particular television stations information forupdating the first price point offer image that is displayed in thefirst television commercial.
 5. The method of claim 1, wherein receivingthe coupon information includes receiving, for each coupon offer of theplurality of coupon offers, a first parameter corresponding to one ormore geographic market areas that are desired by the advertiser; whereinthe method further comprises using the first parameter for each couponoffer of the plurality of coupon offers to identify the multipletelevision stations and to determine, for each of the multipletelevision stations, into which of the plurality of televisioncommercials the visual website indicator is to be inserted.
 6. Themethod of claim 1, further comprising: responding to a given viewer ofany one of plurality of television commercials that contain the visualwebsite indicator that has accessed the website by selecting, from theplurality of coupon offers, one or more coupon offers available to thegiven viewer, wherein the selecting is performed using at least one ormore (i) of a location of the given viewer, or (ii) one or more couponoffers that were previously redeemed by the given viewer.
 7. The methodof claim 1, wherein providing the website includes providing a printablecoupon at the website for redeeming at least one of the correspondingcoupon offers.
 8. The method of claim 7, wherein providing at thewebsite a printable coupon includes providing an offer identifier on theprinted coupon.
 9. The method of claim 7, wherein providing at thewebsite a printable coupon includes providing identification informationon the printed coupon.
 10. The method of claim 7, wherein providing atthe website a printable coupon includes publishing one or moreanti-fraud markings on the printed coupon.
 11. The method of claim 1,wherein providing the website includes enabling users of the website tocredit a card device in order to redeem at least one of the couponoffers.
 12. The method of claim 11, wherein the card device is acustomer loyalty card provided by a retailer.
 13. The method of claim 1,further comprising: identifying, from activity at the website, a numberof instances that individual coupons provided by a correspondingadvertiser have been printed by users of the website.
 14. The method ofclaim 1, wherein receiving the coupon information includes the serverreceiving, for a particular coupon offer specified by the givenadvertiser of a given product, a first price point offer for a firstgeographic market area, and a second price point offer for a secondgeographic market area; and wherein the step of communicating the firstdata, the price point indicators, and the second data includes: theserver selecting one or more television stations for broadcastingtelevision commercials in each of the first geographic market area andthe second geographic market area; the server providing information, tothe selected one or more television stations of the first geographicmarket area, for including an image of the first price point offer withthe visual website indicator in a television commercials for the givenproduct when the television commercial is broadcast from the selectedone or more television stations of the first geographic market area; andthe server providing information, to the selected one or more televisionstations of the second geographic market area, for including a secondimage of the second price point offer with the visual website indicatorin the same television commercial for the given product when thetelevision commercials is broadcast from the selected one or moretelevision stations of the second geographic market area.
 15. The methodof claim 1, wherein the visual website indicator is an image thatdisplays at least a portion of a Uniform Resource Locator for locatingthe website.
 16. The method of claim 1, further comprising: determining,from a given user's interaction with the website, which of the pluralityof coupon offers to display to the given viewer; and identifying atelevision commercial that contained the visual website indicator thatthe given viewer viewed prior to accessing the website.
 17. The methodof claim 1, further comprising: interacting with a computer of a givenuser who accesses the website; determining, at the website, which of theplurality of coupon offers to make available to the user based oninformation determined from interacting with the computer of the givenuser.
 18. The method of claim 17, wherein interacting with the computerincludes identifying a cookie stored on the given user's computer. 19.The method of claim 1, further comprising: determining, from informationprovided by a given user interacting with the website, one or morecoupon offers the given viewer is interested in; using the determinedinformation to identify a geographic market area of the given user; andselecting one or more coupon offers based on the identified geographicmarket area.
 20. The method of claim 19, further comprising identifyingwhich television commercial the user viewed that includes the indicatorto the website from the information provided by the given user.
 21. Themethod of claim 1, wherein receiving coupon information includesreceiving, from a given advertiser, a designated geographic market areafrom which a corresponding coupon offer is to either be made availableor provided at a given value, and then selecting the multiple televisionstations.
 22. The method of claim 21, wherein receiving couponinformation includes receiving an update of the one or more parametersfor individual coupon offers, and wherein the method further comprisesre-selecting the multiple television stations based on and responsive toreceiving the update of the one or more parameters.
 23. The method ofclaim 1, wherein the first data is included in the second data, whereinat least a first station of the multiple television stations receives adifferent set of the first data or the second data than a second stationof the multiple television stations.
 24. A method implemented by one ormore computers and comprising the steps of: (a) receiving, at a serverassociated with a website, and directly from each of a plurality ofadvertisers, coupon information that specifies a corresponding couponoffer on the website, the coupon offers of the plurality of advertisersbeing for different products, wherein the coupon information specifiedfor each coupon offer includes one or more parameters; (b) for eachcoupon offer, the server selecting, based on the one or more parameters,multiple sources from which television commercials are broadcast; (c)for at least a particular coupon offer of the coupon offers, the servercommunicating, across one or more networks, to resources operated ateach of the multiple sources that are selected for the particular couponoffer, advertisement information configured to facilitate selection of aparticular television commercial, associated with the particular couponoffer, in which a visual indicator of the website is to be insertedprior to broadcast of the particular television commercial; (d) theserver communicating to a first source a first visual indicator to beinserted into the particular television commercial, the first visualindicator depicting a first price point; (e) the server communicating toa second source a second visual indicator to be inserted into the sameparticular television commercial, the second visual indicator depictinga second price point different than the first price point; wherein theserver is at a location other than locations of the sources and theadvertisers; wherein the server is logically separated from the sourcesand the advertisers by one or more communications networks comprisingany of a local area network, wide area network, and an Internet; whereincommunicating to the one or more sources is performed in response to anadvertiser of the coupon offer providing the individual coupon offer onthe website.
 25. The method of claim 24, further, comprising selectingthe first visual indicator for the first source and the second visualindicator for the second sources based on one or more parameterscorresponding to one or more geographic market areas associated with theparticular coupon offer.
 26. The method of claim 24, wherein step (a)includes enabling each advertiser to specify, on the website, one ormore parameters corresponding to one or more geographic market areas andone or more price points for the corresponding coupon offer of thatadvertiser.
 27. The method of claim 24, wherein step (a) includesenabling each advertiser to associate one or more specific geographicmarket areas with the corresponding coupon offer of that advertiser; andstep (b) includes selecting, for one or more corresponding couponoffers, the one or more sources from which television commercials arebroadcast based on the specific geographic market area associated witheach of the one or more corresponding coupon offers.
 28. The method ofclaim 27, wherein subsequent to performance of step (a) through step(c), the method further comprises steps of: enabling the advertiser toalter the geographic market area associated with the coupon offer at thewebsite; and re-selecting the one or more sources based on the alteredgeographic market area associated with the corresponding coupon offer.29. The method of claim 24, wherein step (a) includes enabling eachadvertiser to associate one or more price points with the correspondingcoupon offer of that advertiser; and wherein the first visual indicatorand the second visual indicator specify different price points for thesame product.
 30. The method of claim 24, wherein step (a) includesenabling each advertiser to associate one or more price points and oneor more geographic market areas with the corresponding coupon offer ofthat advertiser, including enabling each advertiser to designate aparticular price point with a specific geographic region; and for eachadvertiser that associates the one or more price points and the one ormore geographic regions market areas the corresponding coupon offer ofthat advertiser, step (b) includes: selecting the one or more sourcesfrom which television commercials are broadcast based on one or moregeographic market areas associated with a coupon offer of thatadvertiser, and wherein the visual indicator communicated to eachparticular source of the multiple sources includes a common websiteindicator and an indicator for the price point that is designated withthe geographic market area from which that particular source isselected.